Grayboxx has been generating some buzz online recently with its impending launch… which happened today. And lo and behold, its first target is our very own Burlington, Vermont. From its press release…
Grayboxx Inc., a Silicon Valley-based online local search firm, today announced that Burlington is the first city to gain access to the company’s unique “neighbor-recommended” local search service. By using patent-pending techniques to accurately determine the community popularity and approval for local businesses, grayboxx.com provides the most meaningful local recommendations on the Web. Grayboxx will roll out its service to other communities across the United States in the coming months.
For people who live outside of the largest metropolitan areas, there are few, if any, online local search options that provide extensive business rankings and recommendations. Grayboxx’s unique approach to local search has enabled it to assemble a critical mass of community feedback on more than 3,000 of Burlington’s businesses. The site features more than 12,000 “neighbor recommendations”, covering everything from antique shops to violin stores.
Wow! Burlington’s population is about 38,000… a little more than 12,000 households. Here’s how it works, according to the company…
Grayboxx’s innovative PreferenceScoring™ engine is able to translate everyday actions people take with or about businesses into meaningful expressions of business popularity and quality. For example, when a user checks out a restaurant online, makes a reservation, and then a week later makes another reservation, this can be considered as a positive recommendation of the restaurant.
Online reservations are just one of the many methods used by the powerful new local search engine to assess the top recommendations in Burlington. Grayboxx works by processing anonymous information from a variety of sources to create implicit neighbor recommendations in more than 6,000 yellow page categories in Burlington or in any city. This approach differs greatly from that of current search giants, which rely on manually entered user reviews for their recommendations.
This sounds interesting. Wisdom from boiling down databases… the final dish depends on the ingredients (data) and the chef’s technique (Grayboxx’s software). Let’s see how it tastes…
The following are samples of grayboxx’s top results for businesses and services in Burlington, as ranked by the Burlington community.
The top neighbor-recommended “jewelers” in Burlington are:
* Fremeau Jewelers, with 34 neighbor recommendations
* Von Bargen’s Jewelry, with 12 recommendations
* Hannoush Jewelers, with 3 recommendationsThe top three neighbor-recommended “taxi” services in Burlington are:
* Benway’s Taxi, with 38 neighbor recommendations
* Yellow Cab, with 8 recommendations
* Airport Taxi, with 5 recommendationsA search for “computer repair” in Burlington returns with the following:
* ReCycle North, with 47 neighbor recommendations
* Computer Rescue Squad, with 7 recommendations
* Pine Computers, with 4 recommendations
I just plugged in several other items… groceries, computer dealers, newspapers, shoes, pizza… maybe some of the databases they hope to mine are not quite ripe or fresh. As a local, I haven’t had one search produce what I would call “good advice from a neighbor.” Makes me wonder about the chef’s secret recipe (mysterious ranking criteria)… hard to trust when initial tests come up with what I’m seeing.
I know Grayboxx is taking aim at smaller markets, but this seems more suited for large anonymous metro areas. If I didn’t know anyone local to ask for a reliable and a reasonably priced taxi option, I’d be happy for this kind of service.
Burlington, and all of Vermont, is so reasonably scaled, that lots of this kind of information is near at hand. Ask a few co-workers, friends, etc. Indeed, this is one of the most common types of messages posted among neighbors on Front Porch Forum. People get real “neighbor recommendations” in Burlington everyday this way.
At this point, I’d rather ask a couple hundred neighbors for a computer repair recommendation through FPF than turn to this kind of service. Or I’d sooner take a peek at the local successful reader survey that our weekly alternative paper runs, the much coveted Daisies, by Seven Days. But Grayboxx may be more attractive than some of the other non-local data-driven behemoths stomping through the local online scenes these days. I’ll have to keep trying it… fun to have it here first.
And thanks to Greg Sterling for the lead.
“Neighborhood” seems to be heating up in the online world. Every week brings word of some new service aimed at the neighborhood level. Here’s the latest to come to my attention… Nayburz in Denver.
The site offers forums, classifieds, restaurant menus, etc. What seems different is the ability to define your geographic “bubble” on the fly across these different functions. This may prove an appealing approach for web-centric folks.
I’ve been wanting to write about David Weinberger‘s Everything is Miscellaneous vis-a-vis Front Porch Forum since I had the pleasure of meeting him at a Berkman Center-Sunlight Foundation conference at Harvard earlier this year… so today’s the day.
The reason for my delay in writing is that I’ve been hoping to actually read the book(!), but it hasn’t happened yet. However I have digested enough reviews to be in receipt of the gist. From Amazon.com…
Human beings are information omnivores: we are constantly collecting, labeling, and organizing data. But today, the shift from the physical to the digital is mixing, burning, and ripping our lives apart. In the past, everything had its one place–the physical world demanded it–but now everything has its places: multiple categories, multiple shelves. Simply put, everything is suddenly miscellaneous.
In Everything Is Miscellaneous, David Weinberger charts the new principles of digital order that are remaking business, education, politics, science, and culture. In his rollicking tour of the rise of the miscellaneous, he examines why the Dewey decimal system is stretched to the breaking point, how Rand McNally decides what information not to include in a physical map (and why Google Earth is winning that battle), how Staples stores emulate online shopping to increase sales, why your children’s teachers will stop having them memorize facts, and how the shift to digital music stands as the model for the future in virtually every industry. Finally, he shows how by “going miscellaneous,” anyone can reap rewards from the deluge of information in modern work and life.
My take on David’s thesis is that trying to make one order out of “everything” is hopeless and not even especially useful. Better to tag everything and search anew every time you want to get at something. (Brings to mind huge filing projects in the pre-web days… I remember filling out cross-reference cards and placing them throughout the file cabinets… arghhhhh.)
So I’ve seen with Front Porch Forum. In our pilot city, more than 20% subscribe, each person belonging to their neighborhood’s forum. People post messages for their neighbors about babysitters, lost cats, restaurant reviews, plumber referrals, school tax debate, car break-in, moose sightings, school fundraiser, car for sale and on and on.
A few members have expressed frustration that all these messages aren’t neatly ordered into threads. Or that we don’t offer one part of the site focused on contractor reviews, another area on classified ads, another part for political debate.
Instead, each neighborhood forum publishes a single issue every few days with whatever postings the neighborhood has generated. Each message is clearly labeled. Current and past issues, a mishmash of subjects, may be browsed or searched by keyword, author, street, etc.
I don’t think caging this information into various compartments will serve anyone well. It’s all about the conversation… not order. FPF’s aim is to help neighbors connect and foster community within the neighborhood… not create a Dewey Decimal System at the neighborhood level.
Which brings me to much of web 2.0. Whether it’s real estate, reviews, classifieds, directions, discussion… whatever, many FPF members have reported that they would rather just search their neighborhood’s archive for what they need (and come across other interesting tidbits) or post a brief note to a couple hundred nearby households… rather that then go to one of the burgeoning number of these specialty sites.
Put another way, David argues that many web 2.0 sites free information and make it accessible in many ways. But these examples are still in verticals, such as real estate. So the information is constrained, although it’s accessible to everyone.
Front Porch Forum removes all subject constraint and instead limits who can participate… only residents of a given neighborhood.
For what it’s worth.
Just learned of Neighborrow.com. Seems focused on NYC apartment buildings. Neighbors join and offer to loan stuff to each other, and make requests. Website is up. Featured groups have a couple dozen or fewer members. It has a young feel (don’t borrow from anyone over 30?) and has some plumb media coverage… Grist article and MSNBC interview.
Our neighborhood has a manual version of this. Erik maintains a list of items people are willing to loan. I think he invited several neighbors into the group. Everyone gets the spreadsheet. Need an extra sleeping pad for this weekend’s camping trip? Check the list and make a call. Simple. However, not heavily used either.
This kind of thing seems to happen spontaneously through Front Porch Forum more… “hey, anyone out there have a sleeping pad we can borrow for this weekend?” That would likely get several responses from our nearby neighbors, who may or may not be on Erik’s list. Kind of “just in time” stuff-to-loan. And no database to keep up to date.
The Local Onliner reports today about GetVendors.com today…
Service referral sites like ServiceMagic and Angie’s List have gotten some traction. But by no means are they dominating the business. What will it take?
Ashish Mohole, co-founder of startup GetVendors.com, thinks the key is to guarantee that users get a wide assortment of choices when they make a query. Too many queries come up empty, or return just one or two possibilities, he says…
“Our approach is simple, honest and yet, effective and scalable,” says Mohole.
But most interesting to me was Mohole’s revealing assessment of the field circa mid-2007…
But Mohole also notes that the company’s prospects remain uncertain… Mohole openly wonders whether the time has passed whether startups like his can make a go of it. “All the big guns are pursuing everything possible to get in the local market,” he says. “The local space it is not easy for a start up to get traction in a short period of time without exposing to the risk of big players catching up.
In fact, he and his two other co-founders are contemplating selling the company. “A few years back, the experimentation would have been good idea with start ups making progress under the radar. But now it is more than likely these ideas will get ‘picked up’ and won’t have a chance to build premium value.”
As noted by Mike Boland and Peter Krasilovsky today, Yahoo! Local just rolled out its first redesign in two years with a focus on user-generated content. I know this is a big deal and involves huge sums of money, advertisers and visitors… but I’ve never had anyone tell me that they use this service… an arbitrary measure, but one that’s hard for me to shake. Peter K. compares it to an Oldsmobile… and I guess I’ve never had anyone crow about their Oldsmobile to me either… solid, always there.
Does GM still make Oldsmobiles?
UPDATE: Some more reviews of Yahoo! Local’s changes. First, eNeighbors does a good job sussing out Yahoo’s potential to get neighbors providing content to each other. Here’s someone echoing what we’ve been finding with Front Porch Forum.
And Greg Sterling weighs in… interesting comments to his post.
Sounds like this effort is getting traction…
With the probably exception of Yelp, standalone review sites haven’t figured out a way to make money. In the past year, InsiderPages was sold off to CitySearch, and Judy’s Book, famously, changed its model to coupons.
So why would Josh Walker, Forrester’s former head of consumer research, dive into the game with both feet? Walker’s CityVoter, which raised an initial round of $1.1 million from two Boston-area funders, has been in operation since last year, and now has 25 employees.
CityVoter works with local TV stations…
While the site is still branded as “beta,” the lineup of stations, which get local exclusivity, is getting real. CityVoter now has nine stations, 120,000 registered users, and 410,000 votes. It is expecting to launch 25 more stations before the year is out. More importantly, CityVoter has developed relationships with key station groups – rather than landing deals, one station at a time.
Read more on The Local Onliner.
Fascinating interview today by Mark Glaser with the leadership of Topix and how this online news aggregator is now focusing on local forums.
When local news aggregator Topix decided to set up online forums last December for every city and small town in America, they figured the forums would be a loss leader. After all, online forums have a bad reputation for unfettered discussion, gossip and slander, leading most news organizations to abandon them altogether online. And people on forums are usually more focused on the discussion than on clicking on ads.
But for Topix, the forums have transformed the site from a simple search engine and news aggregator into a series of online water cooler discussions that riff off the news of the day. And with the popularity of forums, Topix has a more engaged audience that stays on the site longer. Plus, Topix is bringing in even more money by serving up forums to newspaper partner sites and sharing ad revenues with them.
Local.com announced a deal with Expedia.com for local travel. Peter Krasilovsky reports…
Local.com is in a different “local” category. It aggregates a ton of local content and features, but it doesn’t necessarily vie with the local Yellow Pages or local search sites, for everyday local traffic.
I mean, it would if it could. It has added a lot of functionality. But mostly, with its easy-to-remember URL (which it paid $700k for), and helpful grab-bag of local features, the site gets its traffic from the type of occasional user who aren’t particularly adept at using Google, or too impatient to do so. It claims quite a few of those – 10 million every month.
$700,000 for a URL… I just wanted to type that once.
Dan Gillmor wrote recently…
Jason Calacanis, who calls his new venture Mahalo “human-powered search,” says the company will pay freelance searchers a fee for links the site accepts. He says he hopes for hundreds or thousands of people in this part-time capacity.
Some similarity to Front Porch Forum in that our subscribers put all sorts of search questions to their neighbors through our service… looking for a roofer, seeking replacement storm windows, babysitter needed, who to talk to about potholes, etc.
Instead of pay, the motivation for members to respond to requests for information is based on their desire to connect with neighbors and build community within their neighborhood. That is, answer a question and get a little healthier community to live in in return.
Ghost of Midnight is an online journal about fostering community within neighborhoods, with a special focus on Front Porch Forum (FPF). My wife, Valerie, and I founded FPF in 2006... read more